All The Things I Never Told You
by bearsbeetsbattlestargalactica
Summary: Annabeth Chase has led a cursed life. But when an accident at a party brings her near-death, and she looks back on the decisions and events that brought her to her present state, she must decide whether or not life is worth living. Percabeth AU.
1. Forgetting How to Swim

**A/N: Here's a kickoff of my new story, All The Things I Never Told You. It's written in a vignette-style, which means the chapters aren't chapters, exactly, but very short excerpts (think half a page to three pages, or about 400-900 words). Updates should be sort of frequent (it's summer now, thank God); I've got a few vignettes written already. I can't say it'll be too long... maybe 20k words max. If you have any comments/questions, review or PM me! I always love reviews ;)**

 **Disclaimer: Don't own PJO or HOO or any consequent subsidiaries.**

 **Rating: T**

 **Summary: Annabeth Chase has led a cursed life. But when an accident at a party brings her near-death, and she looks back on the decisions and events that brought her to her present state, she must decide whether or not life is worth living. Percabeth AU.**

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FORGETTING HOW TO SWIM

It was the peak of summer, the murky month of July, when the air became like bathwater and the sun a piping-hot radiator. Sweat was a balm, blessedly cool against my skin. My hair plastered to my neck with perspiration.

It was a classic summer party; warm, flat beer and itchy grass, girls in skimpy sundresses and bare-chested boys in board shorts. The pool shimmered an eerie blue, lighter than the dimming sky overhead. The sun was perched low on the horizon, washing the party in clementine sunlight, dancing over tanned skin and sun-kissed hair.

I didn't know why I came. I wasn't even invited, not officially. It was thrown a few houses down from mine, and I could hear the music from my bedroom, rattling my windows, a thick, heavy, pulsating beat. For a moment, I just sat there, curled up into a ball on my bed, crumpled Kleenex littering my duvet, empty water glasses on my nightstand. And then I stood, pressed my hand against the windowpane, peered outside. I could see teenagers dancing, could see them swimming, could see bowls of tortilla chips and spiked punch.

And then, before I knew it, I was knotting up my hair, drying my eyes, and slipping out the back door. The air was warm, caressing my cheeks, a tendril or two of honey-blonde hair framing my freckled cheeks. I outstretched my arms and lifted my face up to the sky, breathing in the scent of summer honeysuckle and eucalyptus.

I hopped the fence. No one questioned my presence at the party, or intercepted me when I filled up a red solo cup from a keg. No one asked why I just sat alone on the deck, splintery wood digging into my raw, chafed skin. No one even noticed as I took one drink, and then another, and another, until the world became a pleasant blur of faces and shapes and colors and music, drifting away into a peaceful sleep.

I walked alongside the edge of the pool. Couples were dancing in the flickering water, the lights illuminating their entwined legs, slippery and slick with chlorinated liquid. Pairs of ardent lovers were everywhere, pressed up against lemon trees, sprawled out in the grass, lips swollen and rough, eyes hazy. Groups of teenagers gathered to smoke weed or cigarettes, the more adventurous popping pills. A few girls to my right were taking turns taking long swills from a bottle of vodka.

I paused, looking down at the water, the world spinning. My reflection danced, the sky an inky black overhead, speckled with quicksilver stars. My cheeks were splotchy, my eyes a wild mess of emotions, my hair tangled and knotted around my shoulders. I didn't even recognize myself. I looked desperate, so desperate and so achingly lost, that it made tears well in my eyes, that I took a step forward to reach out to that girl, to embrace that stranger, and slipped.

I fell into the water with a splash too quiet to be heard over the sound of the thumping music. For a moment, I thought I might struggle, might attempt to swim, might break the surface and take in huge, heaving breaths.

I was five years old when I learned how to swim, four years before Mom died. She'd taken me to the beach back in Virginia, dressed me up in a snug-fitting swimsuit and tossed me into the waves. She never bothered with floaties or a lifejacket. She just held me tight, my legs wrapped around her waist, and guided me out into the waves. Eased me into the water, made me trust the blue-gray Atlantic, made me respect but not fear it. Made me sprawl out on my back, made me drift with the waves, up and down, the whole world shifting beneath my back, dropping away, the scent of brine stinging the inside of my mouth, the sea too cold, too jarring.

And at that moment, just as I was about to struggle, just as I was about to scream bloody murder, the coward inside of me squirming, the whole world dropped away. The sky was bright and blue, my mother's reassuring presence mere feet away, her familiar scent of vanilla enveloping me. I just let go. I emptied my soul into the ocean and allowed myself to be carried by the waves, arms and legs kicking and pushing, like the fleshy tentacles of a squid.

But this time, back at the summer party, when I felt my reflexes kick in, when I felt myself begin to swim, as I fell back into the pool, back grazing the gritty floor, I gazed up through the swirling pool water and saw the moon and the stars and the tar-colored sky. It was peaceful down there, at the bottom of the pool. No noise. No sound. Empty and still. I didn't flap my arms, I didn't kick my legs, I didn't fight, I didn't struggle. I just took a long, deep breath of pool water and let go. Even though my mother had been dead for six years now, I could have sworn I smelled vanilla.

My eyes fluttered shut as I reached the concrete floor of the pool. It seemed I had forgotten, in the moment I needed it most, just how to swim.

And then it was not just the sky that was black, but the whole world.

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 **A/N: Please review! (Constructive criticism always welcome)**


	2. How to Say Goodbye

**A/N: Thanks to all reviewers! You guys make my day! Also, to the one guest reviewer who said something like, "this was just posted by another user", I don't know what you exactly mean by that, but if this story is being replicated somewhere, or something like that, I'd really appreciate you telling me. Thanks so much!**

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HOW TO SAY GOODBYE

I was nine years old when Mom died. It was a blessing and curse, being nine years old. I was just old enough that I could remember her, knew exactly the smell of her perfume and the soft texture of her skin, knew precisely the sound of her laugh and the timbre of her voice. I knew my mother, knew her better than I knew myself. But that I meant I knew and loved her enough to miss her.

We were in the car together. She was driving me to school, because I'd missed the bus. I was wearing my St. Mary's uniform, a plaid jumper and a white-collared shirt, wrinkled because both had been left on the floor of my bedroom the night before. My hair was pulled back into two twin ponytails. My nails were covered with chipped electric-blue paint. Mom was angry with me; she was yelling at me for missing the bus, a telltale muscle in her jaw ticking.

And then the truck hit us. A Ford, powder-blue pickup truck, a hungover man behind the wheel. Mom was dead on impact. That was the thing about her death. We never got any last words, any heartfelt goodbyes. They were able to save me, to rescue me from a death far too soon, before my age had even reached double-digits, but Mom was already dead before I got the chance to inhale again.

I never got the chance to say goodbye.

I bore a scar that scraped down my belly, winding around my waist like a twisted belt, faded and white with time. The accident scratched me and killed my mother. I'd have taken a thousand and one scars if it meant having her back, if it meant seeing her one last time before she died, if it meant just getting the chance to say goodbye.

But that was the thing. Even afforded the opportunity, I wasn't sure if I knew how to say goodbye. Farewells were no easy task. Who could sum up a lifetime of missed experiences and loves and failures and joys and sorrows in mere minutes? The words would've clogged in my throat, clumsy and awkward. Maybe it was best I'd never been given the chance to say goodbye. I didn't have to deal with the failure of a farewell on my conscience.

I was lying in a hospital bed when I came to. Dad was sitting in the chair next to me. His eyes were red and raw from crying, his chin coated in a five o'clock shadow. Unshaven, unkempt, utterly destroyed. His voice was ragged when he spoke, like a match scraping against the side of a matchbox. "Hey, princess," he said roughly, scrubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms. "How are you feeling?"

I was feeling terrible. But just then, looking at him, I lied. I had the feeling that, horrible as I was feeling, he was feeling much, much worse. "I'm okay." My voice was raspy, and I cleared it, dizzy and weak. "Where's Mom?"

The thing was, even as I asked the question, I knew. My heart knew, even if my head didn't. The knowledge of that absent goodbye was even then rooted deep in my chest. Logic doesn't always catch up to gut feelings in time. Dad didn't have to tell me. I just knew.

Maybe I did deserve a goodbye. Maybe I would have had one to say after all.

 _Dear Mom. I know I can't make up for years without you. I know that this is a small consolation for a lifetime of missing you. But I want you to know that I love you, and that Dad loves you, and that we'll be okay. Don't worry about us. I love you, Mom. I love you to the moon and back, and all the way to the stars._

Maybe my farewell would not have been such a failure after all. There was no way to know. Mom was dead before I got the chance.

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 **A/N: Hope you enjoy! Please review!**


	3. Looking for Andromeda

**A/N: I'm back! Thanks to all reviewers (seriously, you guys are the BEST). **

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LOOKING FOR ANDROMEDA

Mom and I used to take long walks back in Virginia. We lived in a town near the beach, a town built of that pale, brown, sun-bleached wood indigenous to seaside villages. She would take me to the shore, take off her shoes, and we would walk for miles on the beach, wedging our toes firmly in the sand.

Mom's name was Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom and battle. She was not named for Aphrodite, goddess of beauty and love and seduction so heady it made your knees wobble, or Demeter, goddess of plants and growth and earth. She was named for brilliance and guts and bravery, and I loved her more than anyone else in the world.

She used to tell me stories during our walks –not ones that she made up, but ones that she knew, from books and myths, long-told stories passed down through pairs of breathy lips or through yellowed parchment. She'd wave her hand as she spoke, eyes lighting up with mischief and magic. No one could tell a story like Mom.

She would tell me tales of men with a hundred hands, stories of sons of gods so strong that they could snap stone pillars in half as if they were wooden twigs, stories of horses with wings and a young goddess so naïve, so beautiful, and so kind, that even the god of death could not resist her. But my favorite story was of Andromeda.

"There once," Mom would say, "was a princess named Andromeda.

"Princess Andromeda was born to two loving parents –King Cepheus, and Queen Cassiopeia. But though the two parents loved their daughter very much, they were flawed. The king, you see, was not strong. He was weak and foolish. The queen was very vain, and loved to boast that her daughter was the most beautiful in all the land.

"One day, the queen dared to claim that Princess Andromeda was more beautiful than even the Nereids, or water nymphs, lovely water faeries. The angry, wounded Nereids went to the sea god, Poseidon, and asked him to exact revenge on Queen Cassiopeia. Poseidon sent a horrible sea monster to their kingdom. The monster destroyed everything in its path, killing many.

"The subjects of the kingdom, hungry, grieved, and struggling, appealed to their rulers. The weak king then went to the oracle and asked, 'What must I do in order to ease my people's suffering?'"

"And what did he do?" I'd ask, right on cue, every time.

Mom would ruffle my hair. "The oracle replied, 'You must sacrifice your virgin daughter to the monster in order to satisfy his hunger.' The king reluctantly agreed, and thus Princess Andromeda was chained to the rock. Queen Cassiopeia and King Cepheus watched mournfully from the beach.

"And suddenly, a hero passed by. His name was Perseus. He was an old Greek hero, for he had just beheaded a frightful monster named Medusa, a woman with snakes for hair that could turn any human to stone with just a glance. Upon seeing the lovely Andromeda chained to the cliff, he wept for her, and came to her rescue. 'Lovely girl,' he cried. 'What has happened?'

"Andromeda, modest as she was, would not have replied, but Perseus would not stop questioning her. Finally, she opened her mouth to speak, but the monster suddenly surfaced and began swimming toward Andromeda. The princess screamed.

"Perseus ran to the beach, asked her parents for Andromeda's hand, and gained their blessing. He then rushed back to the princess and cut off the monster's head with his sword in one fell swoop, great hero that he was. He released the lovely princess from her chains, set her down on the beach, and asked for her hand.

"'Yes,' she replied, happy beyond words. 'I am yours.'

"The two lived happily ever after, and upon their death, the goddess Athena placed Andromeda in the stars between her mother, Cassiopeia, and her lover, Perseus. Now, she is forever in the night sky, in the stars at night. She protects those in sorrow and danger everywhere."

After Mom's death, I'd walk up and down the beach at night, my sandals dangling from my fingers, and look up at the sky. Sometimes, on a clear night, I was able to make out the constellation of Andromeda, the spiderwebbed pattern streaking across the murky, crude-oil sky. Mom told me stories of Perseus, too, and his other adventures, but it was always the princess that intrigued me. She wasn't fearless –not even close –but she still found the strength to rebuff a hero, even when she was in need.

Sometimes, I'd imagine Mom was up there, too, looking down on me along with Andromeda, and Perseus, and Cassiopeia, and Hercules, and Cetus, and all of the other constellations.

After all, there are a billion stars in all of time and space, perhaps more. Surely the universe could have found a few for a little girl's mother taken from her daughter's life far, far too soon.

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 **A/N: Hope you liked it! Please review!**


	4. ICan'tBreathe

**A/N: I'm back! Thanks to all reviewers!**

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ICANTBREATHE

I woke to the sound of screams and panic. I felt slick and wet, moist droplets sliding down my skin, though I didn't know if they were beads of sweat or of water. Someone was murmuring, a soft, sweet voice, low and urgent, panicked and hurried.

But those were things I noticed later. What I noticed first was the feeling in my chest.

It felt as if a boulder was sitting atop me, rough and stony, the size of my head. My heartbeat came in erratic, irregular _thumps_. There was a sort of mask over my mouth, oppressive and binding, like the muzzle of a horse, and I wanted to rip it off, wanted to scream and kick and shriek but all I could do was think _ohmygodohmygodohmygodicantbreatheicantbreatheicantbreathe_

Dimly, through a haze, I could see a woman leaning over me. It dawned on me that the sound of screaming had dimmed, that now I could hear sirens. A man in a blue uniform was adjusting things a few feet away, muttering and cursing under his breath. But it was the woman that caught my eye, that struck me, that made the inner monologue of terror cease for just a moment.

She was young, in her early twenties, with vividly violet hair, like the grape-flavored baseball chewing gum you could buy in checkout lines at department stores. Her lips were painted black, her eyes framed by thick, jarring eyeliner, a cat-eye that rivaled even Cleopatra's. Her skin was freckled and porcelain, her eyes a muddled hazel. Piercings curved up the slope of her ear, and a tattoo peeked out of her sleeve. I caught the letters _LOV._

"Fuckin' idiots," the man rumbled, the sound almost a growl. "Drinking near a pool. What the fuck kind of idiot drinks near a pool?"

The woman paid him no attention. "You look like you hold a lotta secrets in that messed-up head of yours," she told me, tapping my temple gently. Her fingernails were long and curved, painted bright red. Hussy red, Mom would've said. She hated fingernail polish.

"She's a cadaver, Persephone," the man barked. "Quit making conversation with the corpses."

"Be a shame," Persephone continued, as if she hadn't heard a word the man had said, "if you died before you got a chance to share 'em." Her eyes glimmered with black mirth. "I bet you've got a whole story just waiting to get out." She smoothed my hair back. "I know you can't breathe, baby. Just stay alive for me, alright? You can do that."

 _I can't,_ I thought, panic coming back. _I can't._

 _I won't._

 _I wouldn't._

 _I don't want to._

My eyes fluttered shut, and I became enveloped in blackness once more. Persephone sighed. "There somebody wanting you here," she said, voice like clover honey dripping from a Mason jar. Sticky and oversweet. "I know. This I know."

All of a sudden, I remembered him, the planes of his face, how he stared at me sometimes when he thought I wasn't looking, or maybe when he knew I _was_ looking. How he'd hold me, how he smelled –like chocolate-chip cookies and the ocean –how he smiled –lopsided, one corner of his mouth tilted up slightly higher than the other –how he laughed –big and hearty, one of those true belly laughs, quiet and then loudly, all at once.

 _icantbreatheicantbreatheicantbreatheicantbreatheicantbreathe_

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 **A/N: Hope you enjoyed! Please review!**


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